A musician plays harp during a practice at an art school that adjoins the Damascus Opera House. Two students were killed when a mortar landed outside the building in April.

Photo: Dusan Vranic, Associated Press

A musician plays harp during a practice at an art school that...

Image 2 of 4

In this Sunday, May 4, 2014 photo, a student plays guitar during a break at an art school which adjoins the Damascus Opera House in Damascus, Syria. Two students were killed and five others were wounded when a mortar landed outside the Opera building in April 2014. (AP Photo/Dusan Vranic)

Photo: Dusan Vranic, Associated Press

In this Sunday, May 4, 2014 photo, a student plays guitar during a...

Image 3 of 4

In this Sunday, May 4, 2014 photo, Syrian National Symphony Orchestra conductor Missak Baghboudarian, right, talks to a singer during a practice at art school which adjoins the Damascus Opera House in Damascus Syria. Two students were killed and five others were wounded when a mortar landed outside the Opera building in April 2014. (AP Photo/Dusan Vranic)

Photo: Dusan Vranic, Associated Press

In this Sunday, May 4, 2014 photo, Syrian National Symphony...

Image 4 of 4

In this Sunday, May 4, 2014 photo, musicians practice at an art school which adjoins the Damascus Opera House in Damascus, Syria. Two students were killed and five others were wounded when a mortar landed outside the Opera building in April 2014. (AP Photo/Dusan Vranic)

Just as Leen Arbid entered the front gate of the Damascus Opera House, a potent symbol of the Assad family's decades-long authoritarian rule over Syria, she heard a deafening bang. And then everything went black.

The drama student was going to her classes that bright Sunday morning when a mortar shell fired from rebel positions on the outskirts of the Syrian capital struck the pavement inside the complex yard, next to an entrance door used by performers.

"Suddenly at 8:15, a mortar hit five meters (yards) from me," the petite 24-year-old with chestnut eyes said. "I was injured and fell to the ground unconscious, bleeding. I didn't feel any pain."

Flying shrapnel from the shell pierced her right leg. Five other of her classmates were also wounded, and two others died in the explosion, which shattered windows on the building and broke glass on a board that advertised a Chopin piano concert that was to be held that day, April 6.

Mortar attacks have become daily occurrence in the Syrian capital of some 2 million, often killing more people than this attack. But the strike last month against the opera house resonated much more loudly through the Damascus community. It was a direct hit against the Assad family's cherished creation.

Hafez Assad, who ruled Syria for three decades with an iron fist, was only a few years in power in 1970 when he laid the foundation stone of the Assad House for Culture and Arts.

Hard economic times and the outbreak of the 1973 Arab-Israeli war stalled construction. The opera was scheduled to open in 1999, but was again delayed by an electrical fire that gutted the main hall.

After Hafez Assad's death in 2000, it fell on his son and successor, Bashar, to finish the job. In 2004, he opened the opera house with his British-born wife, Asma, amid great fanfare and fireworks.

The sprawling complex includes a large opera hall, two smaller theaters and acting, singing and ballet schools, offering classical concerts and works by Arab playwrights. Built with a mix of Western and Arab architecture and decorated with paintings and sculptures by Syrian artists, it expresses the Assad family's vision of Damascus as the Arab capital of culture and politics, with them at the helm as visionaries and reformers.